Jainism Christianity and Science

Author(s): Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: The Indian Press Allahabad

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CHAPTER 8
EVERY SOUL IS ITS OWN GOD
The Jaina view is that every soul is a God in himself, for he who is found to be immortal, omniscient and blissful by nature can be nothing less, than God, and there can be nothing higher than a being who is all
this.
The Christian views are indicated below:
"Hail, O light! For in us, buried in darkness, shut up in the shadow of death, light has shone forth from heaven, parer than the Bun, Sweeter than life here below. That light is eternal life; and whatever partakes of it lives."-(Clement) A.N.C.L. vol. iv. p. 102.
"Then, he that is uninstructed in the word, has ignorance as the excuse of his error; but as for him into whose ears instruction has been poured, and who deliberately maintains his incredulity in his soul, the wiser he appears to be, the more harm will his understanding do him; for he has his own sense as bis accuser for not having chosen the best part. For man has been otherwise consti. tuted by nature, so as to have fellowship with God."--(Clement) A.N.C.L. vol. iv. p. 92.
"Man, that has been free by reason of simplicity, was found fettered to bins. The Lord then wished to release him from his bonds, and clothing Himself with Aesh- divine mystery I-Vanquish. ed the serpent, and enslaved the tyrant death; and, most marvellous of all, man that had been deceived by pleasure, and bound fast to corruption, had his hands unloosed, and was set free. O mystic wonder! The Lord was laid low, and man rose up; and he that fell from Paradise receives as the reward of obedience something greater (than Paradise)-namely, heaven itself."-Ibid. p. 100.
"The soul, in my opinion, is sensual. Nothing, therefore, pertaining to the soul is unconnected with sense, nothing pertaining to
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